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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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Abraham Lincoln 



By 
GEN'L SMITH D. ATKINS 



Compliments of 
SAMUEL HARRIS & CO. 

Machinists' and Manufacturers' Tools and Supplies 

Old No. 23 and 25 S. Clinton St., 

New No. 114 and 116 N. Clinton St. 

Between Washington and Randolph Sts. 

CHICAGO 



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Abraham Lincoln 



By 
GEN'L SMITH D. ATKINS 



Compliments of 
SAMUEL HARRIS & CO. 

Machimsts'' and Mamifacturers' Tools and Sii/'/'l/es 

Old No. 23 and 25 S. Clinton St., 

New No. 114 and 116 N. Clinton St. 

Between Washington and Randolph Sts. 

AGO 



^hY 11 im 



, JAN 27 1913 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN 



Smith D. Atkins, Opera House, Streator, Illinois, Feb- 
ruary 12, 1909, at invitation of G. A. R., Woman's Relief 
Corps, Spanish-American Veterans, and the Daughters of 
the American Revolution. 



Mrs. President, and My Fellow Citizens: 

I came to Streator at the invitation of many 
patriotic societies, including the Daughters of the 
American Revolution, an aristocratic society, the 
aristocracy of blood-relationship to men who had 
performed heroic deeds — true American aristocracy 
—the only aristocracy in this land of liberty and 
equal opportunity. 

The Sons of the American Revolution is a like 
patriotic and aristocratic society. I came near being 
an aristocrat myself. When my friend, Major Gen- 
eral George Crook, commanded the Department of 
the Lakes, with headquarters at Chicago, he wrote 
me that his grand-father was a soldier in the Ameri- 
can Revolutionary War, and he knew that my 
grand-father was, and he thought we should organ- 
ize a Society of the Sons of the Revolution. I 
visited him, and we talked the matter over; I con- 
ducted considerable correspondence, and we called 
a meeting in Chicago to organize, and some young 
fellow, who really knew more about the matter than 
General Crook or myself, raised the point that no 



one could join who did not have the written certifi- 
cate from the Secretary of War that his ancestor 
had been a soldier in the American Revolutionary 
War. "Well," said General Crook, "that rules me 
out; I know that my grand- father was a soldier 
in the Revolutionary War, but I do not know his 
name, and I have not, and cannot obtain such a 
certificate." I was ruled out for the same reason. 
We had called the meeting, and we were both ruled 
out. 

Some years later I visited Council Bluffs, Iowa, 
and a pioneer merchant of that city, J. B. Atkins, 
took me out to ride, and we had not gone far when 
he said, "Was your father's name Adna Stanley 
Atkins?" "Yes," I replied. "And his oldest daughter's 
name was Cynthia?" "Yes," I said, and he continued, 
"Well, your father and my father were brothers." 
Then I said, "Perhaps you know who your grand- 
father was?" "Of course I do," he said, and he told 
me, and I wrote the name down, and when I returned 
to Freeport I wrote to the Secretary of War, and 
soon received a certificate of his service in the 
American Revolution. I may be an aristocrat some 
day. 

But I came here to talk about Abraham Lincoln, 
born one hundred years ago, in almost as humble 
circumstances as the child of Judea, among the poor 
whites of Kentucky on whom the black bondsmen 
looked down in pity, and who rose from that humble 
beginning to become the foremost man in all the 
world in the century in which he lived. Today his 
fame fills all the world, and the world is better be- 
cause he lived. 

In 1816, when seven years old, with his father's 
family he removed to Spencer County, Indiana, and 
aided in building a log house to live in, and clearing 
and fencing a small patch of land for raising crops. 
His boyhood life in Indiana was uneventful, best told, 
as he himself said, "In the short and simple annals 
of the poor." He had few books, and very little 



schooling, but he was an omnivorous reader, borrow- 
ing and reading by the light of burning shavings in 
a friendly cooper-shop all the books he could, even 
the statutes of Indiana, and owning a few. In one 
of his books he wrote: 

"Abraham Lincoln, his hand and pen, 

He will be good, but God knows when." 
In another of his books he wrote, as his historian 
tells us, as if he was ambitious to become a great 
man: 

"Good boys who to their books apply. 

Will be great men by and by." 
In 1830, when 21 years old, he came to Illinois, 
barefooted and driving a yoke of oxen. It is said 
that many years afterward while making a speech 
some one in the audience cried out, "Abe, is it true 
that you came to Illinois barefooted and driving a 
yoke of oxen?" Mr. Lincoln looked over the audience 
carefully, and replied, "I believe there is at least a 
dozen men in this audience by whom I could prove 
that to be true, any one of whom is more respectable 
than the man who asked that question." He was 
always absolutely honest in all things, honest in his 
actions, and honest in his thoughts. It is related 
that he had borrowed a book, "Weem's Life of 
Washington," and by some accident the book had 
become wet, and ruined, when he worked four days 
to pay for it, and it became his own, and he read it, 
and re-read it, until Washington became his hero, 
whose life was to him an inspiration and example. 
It was fortunate for him that he became the owner 
of that book, and really fortunate for him that he 
had so few books to read, for the few that he had 
he completely mastered. 

In 1831, in his twenty second year, he went to 
New Orleans as a hand on a flatboat, receiving as 
his pay eight dollars per month; low wages, but I 
have worked for less, a whole year for thirty dollars, 
two dollars and fifty cents per month. It was hard 
work, but the life of a flatboatman on the Mississippi 



in those early days was full of adventure. At New 
Orleans, with his companions, he visited a slave 
market where a mulatto girl was being sold at 
auction. He could not stand it long, and said, "Come 
boys, let us get away from here — if I ever get a 
chance I will hit that thing hard." To all appear- 
ances, a poor boy working for low wages on a flat- 
boat, no chance to hit slavery would ever come to 
him. But long years afterward the chance did come, 
and he forgot not his vow — he did hit that thing 
hard. 

He returned to New Salem in Sangamon County 
and clerked in a store, where his absolute honesty 
received a demonstration — in selling tea he had 
received pay for two ounces too much, which he dis- 
covered when his customer was gone, and locking 
up the store, he walked many miles to return the 
money. No wonder he so early acquired the nick- 
name of "Honest Abe." With modesty he lived up 
to it all his life long, and it will cling to his memory 
while time shall last. 

He was strong. "It is splendid to have a giant's 
strength; it is unmanly to use it like a giant." He 
never did. But the Clary Grove boys thought they 
could down him, and they matched Jack Armstrong 
against him; neither could down the other; Jack 
Armstrong attempted to take an unfair advantage, 
when young Lincoln "put his foot down firmly," 
and seizing the bully by the throat, he choked him 
until he plead for mercy. Even Jack Armstrong 
declared that Lincoln did right, and all the Clary 
Grove boys were his friends. 

In 1832 came the Blackhawk Indian War, and a 
company was organized at New Salem. Of course 
Abraham Lincoln enlisted. When it came to elect- 
ing a Captain the men gathered around the man they 
wanted for Captain, and the large majority gathered 
around young Lincoln. It was his first great victory, 
and he himself declared that it gave him more 
pleasure than anything that had occurred in his life 



before. Captain Lincoln was not much of a military 
man, and did not quickly learn the proper commands 
to give to his company. One day when his company 
was marching company front, the company came to 
a fence and a gate, and not remembering the com- 
mand to give to make the company march "endwise," 
he sang out, "This company is disbanded for two 
minutes, when it will assemble in line on the other 
side of the fence." During the Civil War I was 
talking to General Steadman, South of Triune, when 
Col. Jim Brownlow, son of the famous Parson Brown- 
low, Colonel of the First Tennessee Cavalry, reported 
to General Steadman for orders, when General Stead- 
man said, "Deploy your regiment and hold the 
enemy." Col. Jim took off his hat, scratched his 
head, and said: "Well, General, I don't know exactly 
what you mean by deploy; but if you mean to 
scatter out and fight, we can do that." "Yes," 
said Steadman, and Col. Jim rode away at a gallop, 
and I heard him yelling. "Boys scatter out there 

and give the rebels ." You may guess what it 

was that Colonel Jim Brownlow wanted his boys to 
give the rebels. 

And when the term of Capt. Lincoln's enlistment 
had expired, and his company was mustered out, 
Abraham Lincoln enlisted as a private in another 
company, remaining in the service until the war was 
ended in victory at Bad Axe. Think of that, think 
of Captain Lincoln enlisting as a private soldier, and 
remaining until "the work he was engaged in" came 
to an end in victory. 

Then he returned to New Salem, and became a 
storekeeper. One day he bought of an immigrant a 
barrel of trash, and for a long time his purchase 
remained unexamined, when he turned the contents 
on the floor, and found an old copy of Blackstone's 
Commentaries. What a mine of knowledge it was 
for young Lincoln, who already knew almost by heart 
the statutes of Indiana. No wonder he became a 
great lawyer. I think that my old friend Walter 



Reeves sitting here on the platform, who has man- 
aged some way in gaining the reputation of being 
himself a pretty good sort of a lawyer, would be 
willing to certify: "The man who knows Blackstone 
by heart cannot help being a great lawyer." 

In 1834 he ran for the legislature, and was de- 
feated. Nothing daunted by defeat he ran again 
for the legislature and was elected. Attending the 
legislature at Vandalia he met Stephen A. Douglas, 
and they became rivals, and the rivalry continued 
during all the years. He moved to Springfield, re- 
solved to practice law. He was in desperate poverty, 
but his wants were few and simple, and his friends 
supplied them. He had been postmaster at New 
Salem, and about two years after he removed to 
Springfield a postoffice inspector was inquiring for 
him, and his friends feared there might be trouble, 
and offered him assistance, but he said, "That's all 
right;" and when the postoffice inspector found 
him, he took a package out of his trunk, carefully 
tied up, and it contained about $34 in the very coins 
he had received, the exact amount due the govern- 
ment. In his utmost need it never occurred to Mr. 
Lincoln that he might use any money that was not 
his own. He continued in the Legislature, and was 
a member of the "long nine" that succeeded in hav- 
ing the capital of Illinois removed from Vandalia to 
Springfield. That was his great object, and he was 
willing to make all sorts of trades, and vote for 
anything that would give a vote for the removal of 
the capital, even for the internal improvement 
scheme that nearly bankrupted and ruined the State. 
There is only one notable and praiseworthy act in 
his legislative career, his joining with Dan Stone 
in a protest against a pro-slavery resolution, showing 
that he could never sanction slavery. He never for- 
got his experience at New Orleans. 

For many years his life was uneventful. He 
traveled the circuit as a country lawyer, telling 
stories at the village taverns. He was not a hand- 



some man. Tall, rawboned, awkward, dressed in 
clothes that rarely fitted him, he was a long ways 
from being good-looking. While traveling from one 
court to another, alone in his old buggy, he met on 
a high bridge across a stream another man, who 
halted Mr. Lincoln, and getting out of his wagon, 
pulled out a double-barreled shotgun, when Lincoln 
asked him what he was going to do. "Well," said 
the stranger, "I have made a vow that if I ever met 
a man that was homelier than I was I would kill 
him." Lincoln looked him over, and said, "Stranger, 
you may shoot." After Mr. Lincoln became Presi- 
dent a woman went to him to plead for the life of 
her boy who had been condemned to be shot for 
sleeping on his post, and she was successful of 
course, for Mr. Lincoln could never resist an appeal 
like that for mercy, and when she left the White 
House, tears streaming down her cheeks, she said, 
"They told me he was a homely man, but I think he 
is the handsomest man I ever saw." My father, to 
console me, I suppose, for my want of good looks, 
often said to me, "Handsome is that handsome does." 
Judged by that apothegm Mr. Lincoln was a hand- 
some man. He was melancholy at times, but he 
was generally full of fun. General Shields, a gallant 
soldier, wounded in the Mexican W^ar, succeeded 
Sydney Breese as Senator from Illinois, and the wags 
said "The ball that entered Shields' breast, instead 
of him, killed Breese." Shields was a pompous little 
fellow, and Mr. Lincoln had been poking fun at him 
in letters published in the Springfield papers, pur- 
porting to come from the "lost townships," and 
Shields challenged him to a duel, and Lincoln 
accepted, and as the challenged party chose broad- 
swords with a high plank between the combatants, 
where little Shields with such a weapon could not 
reach Mr. Lincoln, and the whole thing ended in a 
broad farce. He traded horses one evening, "un- 
sight, unseen," as the boys say, the parties to be 
at the east side of the State house at 9 a. m. the 



following morning, each bringing his "horse;" his 
opponent was on hand early with a sorry specimen 
of a "horse," but promptly at 9 o'clock came Abe 
Lincoln with a wooden saw-horse on his shoulder, 
and amid great merriment it was acknowledged that 
Abe Lincoln had the best of it in that horse trade. 

He was uniformly successful in his law suits, for 
the excellent reason that he never would act as 
attorney in any case unless his client was clearly in 
the right. That was a good way to obtain a repu- 
tation as a successful lawyer, and it was a good way 
to practice law as an honest man. Lincoln was 
honest in his law practice, and honest in everything 
he did — honest with all the world, and honest with 
himself in all his thoughts. 

In 1844 Mr. Lincoln was defeated for Congress, 
but he was elected in 1846, serving one term 
only, and because of his anti-slavery sentiments he 
opposed the Mexican War waged for the extension 
of slavery. No man can oppose a popular war, and 
remain in political life, and apparently Mr. Lincoln 
had given up politics for good, and devoted himself 
to the practice of law. His rival, Judge Douglas, 
was the most ^popular and successful politician in 
America, winning every position he sought, and was 
a United States Senator from Illinois. 

In 1854 occurred the most important event in the 
political history of this country, a new departure on 
the slavery question, that drove Mr. Lincoln again 
into politics. He had no influence in bringing about 
that event, but with the clear vision of a seer, he 
saw its mighty import. Slavery had been the bone 
of contention from the beginning. Although the 
American people. South as well as North, with equal 
valor, had fought to a successful issue, the American 
Revolutionary war, on the Declaration of American 
Independence, drafted by Thomas Jefferson, the en- 
forced slavery of black people was an actual fact, 
and when it became necessary, after the close of the 
Revolutionary war, to adopt a written constitution 



10 



V^AR DEPARTMENT. 

JAN S7 1913 



for the new Nation, it was found that no permanent 
strong government could be adopted without com- 
promises on the slavery question. True it is that 
during the progress of the Revolutionary war, George 
Rogers Clark, under the direction of Patrick Henry, 
the Governor of the Colony of Virginia, had con- 
quered the Illinois country, in one of the most bril- 
liant military campaigns in history, as fascinating as 
one of the stories of Aladin's lamp — I wish I had time 
to dwell upon it — adding to Virginia all the country 
west of the Allegheny mountains, north of the Ohio 
and east of the Mississippi, out of which five of the 
most populous and wealthy States of the Union have 
since been formed, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin 
and Michigan, and with a magnanimity unparalleled 
in all the history of the world, Virginia ceded that 
vast empire to the general government, two years 
before the adoption of the Constitution of the United 
States, in 1787, by the Northwest Ordinance, drafted 
by Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of 
American Independence, and by that ordinance 
slavery was forever excluded from all that country, 
from the soil upon which we are now living, where 
this beautiful city is now located. To my mind the 
passage of that law, in 1787, indicated the trend of 
thought in the minds of the fathers of the Republic 
in favor of liberty, for it covered all of the territory 
then belonging to the general government. 

But later, when the written constitution of the 
Republic was formulated, the most wonderful written 
constitution in all the world's history, referred to by 
Mr. Gladstone, England's greatest statesman, as "the 
epitome of human wisdom in the science of human 
government," it was found absolutely necessary to 
compromise with slavery, and three compromises 
were placed in the Constitution: 1st, the African 
slave trade was continued for twenty years — think 
of that, for twenty years the Southern States con- 
tinued to import black people from Africa and hold 
them in perpetual bondage; 2nd, three fifths of 

11 



the black people of the South were counted for 
representation In Congress — five black persons — 
slaves — were counted the equal of three white free 
men — in other words, the South had representation 
in Congress for its property in human beings; and 
3d, slaves escaping from their masters were given 
up on claim. All of those compromises of the Con- 
stitution were faithfully observed. The African 
slave trade was continued for twenty years; three- 
fifths of the slaves were counted for representation 
in Congress, and the Fugitive Slave Law was en- 
forced. 

The slavery question would not down. In 1815 
Louisiana was purchased by Thomas Jefferson, then 
President of the United States, from Napoleon Bona- 
parte for fifteen millions of dollars, giving the United 
States a vast empire west of the Mississippi; I have 
not time to dwell upon that wonderful transaction 
between two of the most remarkable men in the 
world. Napoleon Bonaparte compelled to sell, for he 
was preparing for his last great battle of Waterloo, 
where he was overthrown by Wellington, England's 
Iron Duke, and Thomas Jefferson, the country lawyer 
of Virginia, who had drafted the Declaration of In- 
dependence, and the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, 
and who added to his fame by the Louisiana pur- 
chase. Five years later, in 1820, Missouri, west of 
the Mississippi, a part of the Louisiana purchase, ap- 
plied for admission to the Union as a State, with a 
slave state Constitution. There was great opposi- 
tion, but again a compromise with slavery, and at 
the instance of Jesse B. Thomas, United States 
Senator from Illinois — it is curious to note the 
prominent part of Illinois in the early history and 
final settlement of the slavery question — Missouri 
was admitted with slavery, while the compromise 
was that slavery was to be forever excluded in the 
new territory north of 36-30. the south line of the 
new state, again all the territory then belonging to 
the general government. That compromise appeared 

12 



to settle the question of slavery in the territory 
north of that line. Now mark well, in 1854, Stephen 
A. Douglas, United States Senator from Illinois, 
Chairman of the Committee on Territories, intro- 
duced a bill to organize the Territories of Kansas 
and Nebraska. The bill, like all bills for the erection 
of new territories, contained no provision for the re- 
peal of the Missouri Compromise; but the bill, at the 
instance of Senators Dixon, of Kentucky, and Atch- 
ison, of Missouri, was recommitted to the Commit- 
tee on Territories, and nineteen days afterward was 
again introduced by Senator Douglas with a clause 
repealing the Missouri compromise of 1820, and ad- 
ding what Thomas Hart Benton called "a stump 
speech in the belly of the bill," "it being the true 
intent and meaning of this act not to legislate 
slavery into any Territory or State, nor to exclude 
it therefrom, but to leave the people thereof per- 
fectly free to form and regulate their domestic in- 
stitutions in their own way, subject only to the Con- 
stitution of the United States." 

That was a new departure in the politics of this 
Nation. The policy of the fathers of the Republic, 
as shown in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, to 
exclude slavery from the new territories, and again 
in the Missouri Compromise of 1820, excluding slav- 
ery from the new Territories north of the south line 
of that State, was reversed and repealed, and the 
new Territories from which slavery was excluded by 
a law of Congress, were opened up to slavery. The 
South, dominating the Deniocratic party, made that 
new departure a part of the Democratic creed, and 
it was on that state of facts that Abraham Lincoln 
came back into political life. He saw, more clearly 
than any other man in America, the aim and ulti- 
mate object of the repeal of the Missouri Compro- 
mise. It took complete possession of him — it 
permeated every fiber of his nature — for he did care 
whether slavery was voted up or voted down — he 
loved liberty, not only for himself, but for all the 

13 



world — for all meir, without regard to color; he was 
satisfied while the policy of the fathers prevailed, 
while the public mind rested securely in the belief 
that "slavery was in the course of ultimate extinc- 
tion," but he was aroused to action when that policy 
was reversed, and slavery extension became the 
paramount political question. The entire country 
was aroused as never before in all its history. In 
October, 1854, Senator Douglas returned to Illinois 
to defend before the people his course in repealing 
the Missouri Compromise, and Abraham Lincoln 
"camped upon his trail," the one public man in the 
great Northwest who was thoroughly aroused to 
action. Senator Douglas spoke for three hours Oc- 
tober 3, in Springfield at the State Fair, and the 
next day, October 4, Mr. Lincoln answered him, and 
Douglas on the following day, October 5, replied to 
Lincoln. On October 12, Mr. Lincoln spoke in Pe- 
oria, a long and able speech in which iie said, "No 
man is good enough to govern another man without 
that man's consent. I say this is the leading prin- 
ciple, the sheet anchor of American Republicanism." 
All men know it now. Mr. Lincoln was nominated 
and elected a member of the Illinois Legislature, but 
to his surprise, and the surprise of almost everyone, 
it was found that the Illinois Legislature would have 
an anti-Nebraska majority, and could elect a United 
States Senator on joint ballot, and Mr. Lincoln re- 
signed as a member of the Legislature and became a 
candidate for Senator, receiving the caucus nomina- 
tion; but the anti-Nebraska majority in the Legis- 
lature was composed of those who had been Whigs 
and Democrats, and four Democrats would not vote 
for Lincoln because he had been a Whig, and Mr. 
Lincoln withdrew from the contest in favor of Ly- 
man Trumbull. No more generous action was ever 
taken by a public man in American politics; he was 
willing to subordinate himself to the triumph of the 
principle he advocated. When it was all over, when 
Mr. Trumbull was elected Senator, and Mr, Lincoln 

14 



was in the office of the Secretary of State, some one 
said, "Well, Abe; how do you feel?" He replied, 
"When I was a boy I went bare-foot ; one day I 
stubbed my toe! I was too big to cry, and it hurt too 
bad to laugh." It was a homely answer, but told 
the whole story. 

Lincoln was more than ever in politics; he dis- 
cussed it everywhere he went on the circuit practi- 
cing law. Atone place he met Judge T. Lysle Dickey; 
they occupied a room together at the village hotel, 
with two beds in it, and they discussed the question 
until Dickey went to sleep, but when he woke up 
Lincoln was sitting up in bed, and, as if continuing 
the conversation said, "Dickey I tell you this coun- 
try cannot exist half slave and half free," and Dickey 
replied, "O, Lincoln, go to sleep." But sleeping or 
waking Mr. Lincoln could not shake off his interest 
in the mighty problem that confronted the coun- 
try. In one of his speeches he declared, "A house 
divided against itself cannot stand! I believe this 
government cannot endure permanently half slave 
and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dis- 
solved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I 
do expect that it will cease to be divided. It 
will become all one thing or the other. Either the 
opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread 
of it and place it where the public mind shall rest 
in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate ex- 
tinction, or its advocates will push it forward, till 
it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old 
as well as new, North as well as South." 

There was no Republican party in Illinois, no 
party machinery provided for calling conventions 
and making nominations, and on February 22, 1856, 
the anti-Nebraska editors of Illinois met at Decatur, 
and with no other authority than good common 
sense, appointed the first Illinois Republican State 
Central Committee that called the first Republican 
State Convention at Bloomington, May 2, 1856, that 
nominated Congressman William H. Bissell for Gov- 

15 



erncr. a gallant soldier of the Mexican War, the 
first Republican nominated and elected Governor of 
Illinois. Mr. Lincoln was urged to become a candi- 
date for G-overnor of Illinois, but he declined be- 
cause he thought that Bissell, who had been a Demo- 
crat, could poll more votes than an old Whig. Mr, 
Lincoln was at that Convention and there made 
what is known as "Lincoln's Lost Speech" for the 
reporters were so carried away with it that they 
forgot to report it; he argued against the threat of 
disunion made by the South, and all remembered 
his closing words, "We will say to the Southern 
Disunionists, we won't go out of the Union, and you 
shan't." Mr. Lincoln never departed from that 
statement made at Bloomington on May 2, 1856. 

In that campaign of 1856 the Republican party 
nominated its first candidate for President, John 
Charles Fremont, and the Democrats nominated 
James Buchanan, and although in Illinois the Re- 
publicans elected Bissell the first Republican G-ov- 
ernor, the electoral vote of Illinois was given to 
Buchanan, and he was elected President by a tre- 
mendous majority. The repeal of the Missouri Com- 
promise had been submitted to the people at a presi- 
dential election, and apparently the people had given 
it their approval by the election of the Democratic 
candidate. The lovers of liberty were deeply de- 
pressed, while the advocates of slavery extension 
were correspondingly elated. 

Now again mark well. The election occurred 
in November, 1856. In his annual message to Con- 
gress on the first Monday of December, 1856, Presi- 
dent Pierce demanded that the people should respect 
the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United 
States, as if he was expecting some extraordinary 
decision from that court, and it followed almost 
immediately in the Dred Scott case. 

The facts were simple. They arose here in Illi- 
nois. Dred Scott, a negro slave, was brought by 
his master in Missouri to Rock Island in Illinois, in 

16 



JAN S7 1913 



1834, and for two years was held as a slave at 
Rock Island, here upon the soil of Illinois, forty- 
seven years after the adoption of the Northwest 
Ordinance of 1787, that threw its protecting shield 
of freedom over the soil of this State, and sixteen 
years after the adoption of the Free State Constitu- 
tion of Illinois; and then Dred Scott was taken 
back to Missouri, and he brought suit in the United 
States court for his freedom, and that suit was ap- 
pealed to the Supreme Court of the United States, 
and that court decided: 

"Every citizen has a right to take with him into 
the territory any article of property which the Con- 
stitution of the United States recognizes as prop- 
erty. 

"The Constitution of the United States recognizes 
slaves as property, and pledges the Federal Govern- 
ment to protect it. And Congress cannot exercise 
any more authority over property of that description 
than it may constitutionally exercise over property 
of any other kind. 

"The Act of Congress, therefore, prohibiting a 
citizen of the United States from taking with him 
slaves when he removed to the Territory in question 
to reside, (The North West Ordinance of 1787), is 
an exercise of authority over private property which 
is not warranted in the Constitution, and the re- 
moval of the plaintiff, by his owner, gave him no 
title to Freedom." 

Judge Roger B. Taney, the Chief Justice of the 
United States who delivered the opinion of the 
■ court, said, "No tribunal acting under the authority 
of the United States, whether it be legislative, ex- 
ecutive or judicial, can exclude slavery from any 
State or Territory where the Constitution of the 
United States is supreme." The slave power had 
become aggressive. The Supreme Court had de- 
clared the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, and the 
Missouri Compromise of 1820, and the free State 
Constitution of Illinois, so far as it related to slav- 

17 



ery, null and void. Henceforth slavery went every- 
where that the Constitution of the United States 
was supreme, into all of the territories, and into 
all of the States as well, if that decision of the Su- 
preme Court was to become the rule of the political 
"action of the people of this country, Robert Toombs, 
of Georgia, was well within the meaning of that de- 
cision when he declared his purpose to call the 
roll of his slaves in the shadow of the Bunker Hill 
monument. 

It was on this state of historic facts that the 
joint debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen 
A. Douglas took place in 1858. Slavery extension 
was the principal subject debated, and, all too briefly 
I have endeavored to state the legal status of that 
question. Some of you remember it well; some 
of you have forgotten it; most of the voters of today 
have never heard of it. 

I attended but one of those joint debates, the 
one at Freeport, August 27, 1858, fifty years ago. 
Mr. Lincoln arrived in Freeport about nine o'clock 
in the morning of that day, on the train from Men- 
dota, and went to his room in the Brewster House. 
I visited his room soon after his arrival. It was 
crowded with people calling on Mr. Lincoln. The 
question being discussed at the time when I entered 
the room was the solemn manner of Mr. Lincoln in 
the first joint debate held at Ottawa; nearly every- 
one present insisted that Mr. Lincoln should change 
his solemn method of debate, should tell stories, as 
Tom Corwin, of Ohio, did, and "catch the crowd." 
Mr. Lincoln listened with infinite patience and good 
nature to all that anyone had to say on that ques- 
tion, not entering into the argument himself; after 
a while, when the conversation appeared to be ex- 
hausted, Mr. Lincoln said, "There is another matter 
to which I wish to invite your attention," and he 
took from his breast coat pocket slips of paper on 
which were written in pencil the questions that Mr. 
Lincoln proposed to ask Mr. Douglas in the joint de- 

18 



bate in the afternoon. The reading of those ques- 
tions was greeted by all present, so far as I could 
judge, with a storm of opposition, especially the 
second question, which was: 

"Can the people of a United States Territory, in 
any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen of 
the United States, exclude slavery from its limits 
prior to the formation of a State Constitution?" 

The room was crowded, many distinguished peo- 
ple were present, among whom I remember Hon. 
Elihu B. Washburne, then a Member" of Congress 
from that district; Owen Lovejoy, of the Princeton 
district; Hon. Norman B. Judd, of Chicago; Hon. 
Horatio C. Burchard, who was afterward elected a 
Member of Congress to succeed Mr. Washburne, who 
was sent by General Grant as Minister to France; 
Col. James O. Churchill, now residing in St. Louis; 
Colonel J. W. Shaffer, afterward chief United States 
quartermaster in New Orleans, and many more, for 
people were constantly coming and going, the door 
all the time wide open; it was in no sense a formal 
conference of leading Republicans as to the course 
Mr. Lincoln should pursue; it was entirely an in- 
formal conversation that appeared to have come 
about by accident, all present, so far as I can now 
remember, protested stoutly against the policy of 
asking that second question; all agreeing that Sen- 
ator Douglas would answer, that under his doctrine 
of "popular sovereignty" by "unfriendly legislation" 
the people of a United States Territory could ex- 
clude slavery, and that he would "catch "the crowd," 
for the supporters of Judge Douglas in Illinois, gen- 
erally speaking, were anti-slavery in sentiment; they 
did not believe that the people of any new Terri- 
tory would curse the soil with slavery of their own 
free will; all predicted that Judge Douglas would 
so answer, and defeat Mr. Lincoln as a candidate 
for Senator from Illinois; again Mr. Lincoln listened 
with infinite patience and good humor to all that 
•anyone had to say against the policy of his asking 

19 



that second question; after a while, Mr. Lincoln 
slowly said: "Well, now, as to your first proposition, 
that I shall change my line of argument and tell 
stories, I won't do it; the matter is altogether too 
solemn, and I won't do it; that is settled. Now, as 
to the second proposition; I don't know how Mr. 
Douglas will answer; if he answers that a Terri- 
tory cannot exclude slavery, I will beat him; but 
if he answers as you say he will, and as I believe he 
will, he may beat me for Senator, but he will never 
be President." 

Mr. Lincoln, like Napoleon, was willing to listen 
to the advice of any one, of everybody, but like Na- 
poleon, he followed his own opinion in the end. He 
had as fully as any man could have the courage of 
his individual convictions, and he always followed 
them with fidelity to the end, no matter what the 
cost. He appeared to be entirely clear in his own 
mind; nothing that anyone had said against the 
policy of his asking that question changed in any 
way his own personal conviction; by asking that 
question he impaled Judge Douglas on the horns 
of a dilemma; put him into a hole from which there 
was no possible escape; for, answer as he would, 
whatever way he chose, he must antagonize his sup- 
porters in Illinois and lose the Senatorship, or he 
must antagonize the people of the South, who de- 
pended upon the decision of the Supreme Court in 
the Dred Scott case to carry slavery into all the 
territories, there being according to that decision, 
no power on earth that could exclude slavery from 
any Territory, that court having decided that Con- 
gress acted illegally when it passed the Northwest 
Ordinance of 1787, and the Missouri Compromise of 
1820. The superior skill of Mr. Lincoln as a debater 
put Mr. Douglas into that hole. 

In the afternoon when the debate took place, Mr. 
Lincoln, against the protest of all his friends, fol- 
lowing his own clear conviction, did ask that ques- 
tion of Mr. Douglas, and Mr. Douglas did answer, as 



everybody said he would answer, just as Mr. Lincoln 
believed that he would answer, that the people of a 
Territory could, in a lawful manner, by "unfriendly 
legislation," exclude slavery and Mr. Douglas 
pleased his friends and supporters in Illinois, and 
did "catch the crowd" and he did beat Mr. Lincoln 
as a candidate for Senator from Illinois. But that 
answer made by Mr. Douglas on the afternoon of 
August 27, 1858, in Freeport, to Mr. Lincoln's ques- 
tion, so offended the people of the South that they 
instantly denounced Judge Douglas as a traitor to 
the South, and it made his nomination for President 
by a united Democratic party impossible, as Mr. 
Lincoln had predicted, and as was abundantly dem- 
onstrated two years later at the national Democratic 
Convention in Charleston, South Carolina, when 
that convention split upon the question of the nomi- 
nation of Judge Douglas as the Democratic candidate 
for President. Mr. Lincoln had a clearer vision than 
any of his supporters in Illinois. He was hunting 
bigger game than the senatorship from this State. 
He gave up the senatorship to win the Presidency. 
His asking that question of Mr. Douglas made it 
impossible that Mr. Douglas should reach the Presi- 
dency, and it made Mr. Lincoln so well known 
throughout the country that he himself was nomi- 
nated and elected President. It is a wonderful chap- 
ter in the political history of this country, full of 
interest to those who were living at that time, and 
of intense interest to those who first hear that his- 
tory related. 

Stephen A. Douglas and Abraham Lincoln were 
both remarkable men; Douglas a Democrat, Lincoln 
a Whig; Douglas born in Vermont, Lincoln in Ken- 
tucky; both were poor, both came to Illinois when 
young men; Douglas well educated, Lincoln with no 
education; both were lawyers that early became 
political rivals, one as eager as the other for office 
and popularity among the people; Douglas meeting 
with remarkable success in his political ambitions, 

21 



a member of the legislature, Secretary of State, 
Judge of the Supreme Court, and United States 
Senator; Lincoln, only one term in Congress, and 
many disappointments; yet at Freeport, August 27, 
1858, by his clear vision and superior intellectual 
ability as a debater, Mr. Lincoln passed his rival 
and went onward to the Presidency, the goal of 
political ambition, which Mr. Douglas never reached. 

On February 27, 1860, Mr. Lincoln made his re- 
markable speech at Cooper Institute, New York, in 
which he told no stories, but captured his hearers by 
his sound and logical reasoning, and challenged the 
attention of the entire country, as the "new states- 
man who had come out of the West," and he closed 
that speech with these ringing words: "Let us have 
faith that right makes might, and in that faith let 
us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand 
it." 

On May 9, 1860, the Illinois Republican Convention 
at Decatur elected delegates to the Republican 
National Convention instructed for Mr. Lincoln. 
Rails that Mr. Lincoln had made were brought into 
the convention, and gave him the nickname of the 
"Rail Splitter." On May, 16 1860, Mr. Lincoln was 
nominated for President by the Republican National 
Convention at Chicago. I was present at that con- 
vention, not as a delegate, but as a visitor. Some 
people thought that William H. Seward, of New 
York, would be nominated. It was the first time a 
special building had been provided, called a "wig- 
wam," for the meetings of the Republican National 
Convention. There were no tickets of admission — 
seats for the delegates and alternates were the only 
seats reserved. Mr. Seward's friends had come from 
New York in great force, several hundred, with a 
fine band of forty pieces, but while they paraded the 
streets with fine music the friends of the Illinois 
"Rail Splitter" had crowded the "wig-wam" full, so 
that the friends of Mr. Seward when they came to 
the convention building could not get in, and had to 

22 



be content to do their shouting for Seward on the 
outside. 

When Mr. Lincoln was nominated the Illinois boys 
shouted with joy until the rafters of the "wig-wam" 
shook. His nomination was ratified by the people 
of Illinois with great enthusiasm; when Stephen A. 
Douglas was told of Lincoln's nomination, he said, 
"There will not be a tar barrel left in Illinois," and 
there was not, for bonfires lighted up the sky from 
the Wisconsin line to Cairo. Mr. Lincoln was not 
there. He remained quietly at his modest home in 
Springfield, as unpretending as he always was, so 
true to his individual convictions that when the 
committee of distinguished Republicans visited 
Springfield to formally notify him of his nomination, 
he would not himself, or permit his friends, to regale 
them with anything but cold water. His temper- 
ance principles were illustrated in his daily life. 
Douglas took the stump. Lincoln followed the best 
traditions of the Republican and remained quietly at 
his home in Springfield. Personal abuse was heaped 
upon him, but he made no reply. 

When the votes were counted it was found that 
Abraham Lincoln was fairly elected President of the 
United States according to all the forms of law. 
Then the conspirators of the South, the leading 
politicians of that section instantly, without waiting 
for Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, organized rebellion. 
John B. Floyd, Buchanan's Secretary of War, as if 
anticipating the thing that happened, emptied every 
arsenal in the North and filled every arsenal in the 
South, with arms and ammunition, and they were 
instantly siezed, and long before Mr. Lincoln was 
inaugurated, the South was an armed camp. Timid 
people feared disunion, and called on Mr. Lincoln 
for some quieting statement. He gave none. His 
private secretary, Mr. John G. Nicolay sent out a 
printed circular letter saying that Mr. Lincoln's 
views were already well known. To William Pitt 
Kellogg, E. B. Washburne, Henry J. Raymond, and 

23 



others, Mr. Lincoln himself wrote to say, "entertain 
no compromise on the question of the extension of 
slavery." On that question he was as steady as the 
shining stars. 

He prepared his inaugural address, and had it 
printed in Springfield, and while he made verbal 
changes, there was no change of principle made in 
it. 

On February 11, 1861, he left his home in Spring- 
field to go to Wiashington. History does not contain 
an account of a sadder parting, and no man ever 
made a more pathetic speech than his farewell to 
his neighbors and friends at the Alton depot in 
Springfield, placing his dependence upon Almighty 
God, and asking their prayers. 

His journey to Washington was an ovation. He 
made many speeches, but he made no apologies for 
having been elected. His life was threatened, but 
he arrived in Washington safely and was inaugu- 
rated President March 4, 1861. 

His inaugural address contained no bravadp — it 
was firm as adamant — full of pleadinjrs with his 
misguided fellow-citizens, to whom he said, "You can 
have no war without being yourselves the agecressors. 
The government will not assail you. You have no 
oath registered in heaven to destroy the govern- 
ment, while I shall have the most solemn one to 
preserve, protect and defend it. We are not enemies, 
but friends. We must not be enemies. Though 
Dassion may have strained, it must not break our 
bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, 
stretching from every battle-field and patriot grave 
to every living heart and hearthstone all over this 
broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union 
when again touched, as surely they will be, by the 
better angels of our nature." 

As he read his address, so disnassionate, so full 
of charity, so devoid of malice, who do you think it 
was who stood there by his side holding his hat? 
Tt was United States Senator Stephen A. Douglas, 

24 



of Illinois. Tliey were political rivals, but they 
were not personal enemies. 

And when Mr. Lincoln called for seventy-five 
thousand three months volunteers I enlisted in the 
army, and went with my company to Springheld, 
and between Decatur and Springfield our train was 
sidetracked to give a clear right of way to a special 
train bearing Senator Douglas to Springfield from 
Indianapolis, where he had spoken the evening be- 
fore, and when his train went by, our train followed, 
and at the Wabash depot in Springfield, when we 
were filing out of the cars, someone on horseback 
told us to wait until Senator Douglas came from 
his hotel to make us a speech, and he soon came, 
and standing up in his open carriage he welcomed 
us to the capital of the State, bid us God speed in 
the serious work in which we were about to engage, 
and then the Senator said: "The time has come 
when there can be but two parties in this country, 
a party of patriots, and a party of traitors." I tell 
you, my fellow-citizens, my hat went high in air 
for Stephen A. Douglas. I did not agree with him 
in politics, but I did honor his splendid loya'ty to 
his country. He was as loyal as was Mr. Lincoln. 
Better still, the Douglas Democrats of Illinois, yes, 
the Douglas Democrats throughout all the loyal 
North, were as loyal as their loyal leader. A few- 
weeks later, at the age of only forty-seven, the great 
Senator died, leaving a shining record of loj'alty to 
his country. 

Abraham Lincoln was master of himself, holding 
steadily to his own clear convictions, and he was 
the "Master of Men." With patience infinite, with 
courage sublime, he waited for the South to fire 
the first shot at the old fiag, and when the guns of 
the Southern people fired upon Sumter, he called 
for volunteers. When Seward wrote him that the 
administration was without a policy and tendered 
his services to lead the administration, he quietly 
called his attention to his inaugural address, and 



told him plainly if that policy was to be changed 
he would do it himself. When Simon Cameron, his 
first Secretary of War, proved inefficient, he sent 
him as Minister to Russia, and appointed Stanton, 
who had neglected him so cruelly as an associate 
counsel in a great law suit at Cincinnati. He rose 
above jealousy, and when Stanton, in a passion, tore 
up an order he had sent him, he laughed, and waited 
until Stanton had time to cool off, and then, quietly 
repeated the order, and Stanton obeyed it, for he 
had met his master. When Fremont, and Hunter 
issued proclamations freeing the slaves, he annulled 
them without hesitation, and announced that he re- 
served that policy to himself alone. When he re- 
solved upon that step he prepared his proclama- 
tion, and told his cabinet that the policy was fixed; 
they could not change that; but they might com- 
ment on its wording, and the time for its issue. 
When Greely demanded a policy looking to peace 
negotiations, he appointed Greely as peace commis- 
sioner, and turned the laugh upon the great editor. 
He removed McClellan when the time had fully 
come. When a great committee waited upon him 
to have Grant dismissed, falsely saying he was a 
drunkard, he completely squelched the committee by 
declaring that if he could find out the brand of 
whisky Grant used he would send a barrel to every 
one of his Generals. When a pompous Englishman 
found Lincoln blacking his own boots, and told him 
no gentleman in England did that, he squelched 
him completely by instantly inquiring "Whose boots 
does he black?" WHien an old friend said to him, 
"Well, Abe, this thing of being President is not 
what it is cracked up to be," he said, "No, I some- 
times feel like the Irishman who was ridden on a 
rail, and remarked 'if it wasn't for the honor of 
the thing, I would rather have walked.' " When the 
lines were forming for battle, and a rabbit scur- 
ried to the rear, a major said "Go it cottontail; if 
it was not for my honor I would be with you." When 

26 



badgered by a committee telling him how to con- 
duct the war, he said, If Blondin was carrying your 
treasure on a tight rope across Niagara river would 
you badger him by yelling, Blondin, lean a little 
more to the South? or, Blondin, lean a little more 
to the North? or would you keep still until Blondin 
was across?" When questioned as to his re-election 
he declared that it "was no time to trade horses in 
the middle of the stream." Homely ways, that the 
people understood, of hitting the nail on the head 
every time. Wlien serenaded after his second elec- 
tion he declared, "So long as I have been here, I 
have never willingly planted a thorn in any man's 
breast." He went to the Gettysburg battlefield and 
spoke a few sentences in language as simple as 
was used by St. Paul in his sermon on Mars Hill, 
and it attracted the attention of the world as a mas- 
terpiece of oratory, and is today repeated in every 
school in America. And when Grant, the greatest 
General of the Century, came to the East with 
Sheridan, and Sherman and Thomas commanded in 
the West, all acting on a common plan, the Southern" 
Confederacy was crushed, and when Richmond was 
evacuated Lincoln visited that city, on foot and al- 
most alone, and hunted up the home of General 
Pickett, who had fought so bravely in the Confed- 
erate Army at Gettysburg, and knocking at the door, 
a woman opened it, and he inquired, "Is this George 
Pickett's home?" The woman answered, "Yes, and 
I am George Pickett's wife, and this is his baby," and 
he said, "I am Abraham Lincoln," and she exclaimed, 
"What, President Lincoln," and he said, "No, Abra- 
ham Lincoln, George's old friend." The foremost 
man in all the world was simply Abraham Lincoln. 
What a load was lifted from his shoulders when the 
end of the war came in complete victory, with slav- 
ery forever dead — how bright the future appeared 
to him — how happy he was! He said to his wife, 
"Mary, we have had a hard time of it since we came 
to Washington; but the war is over, and with God's 



blessing we may hope for four years of peace and 
happiness, and then we will go back to Illinois, and 
pass the rest of our lives in quiet. We have laid 
by some money, and during this term we will try 
and save up more, but we shall not have enough to 
support us. We will go back to Illinois, and I will 
open a law office in Springfield or Chicago, and at 
least do enough to help give us a livelihood." How 
simple, how like the great man he was. Little did 
he suspect that he would so soon pass from earth. 
On the evening of April 14, 1865, at Ford's Theatre 
in the City of Washington, an assassin sent a bul- 
let into his brain. He never spoke again. Some- 
times I almost despair of the Republic. Three Presi- 
dents, all of whom I knew, for I knew Garfield while 
he was Chief of Staff of the Army of the Cumber- 
land, and McKinley before he was elected to Con- 
gress, have met death by assassination. Why the 
Good Lord God Almighty permitted it, I do not un- 
derstand. God's ways are not our ways. We dare 
not criticise. We must submit. His great War 
Secretary Stanton standing by his bedside when his 
spirit took its flight, said, "Now he belongs to the 
ages." "Name his name once more — Abraham Lin- 
coln — then leave it in undying glory forever shining 
on in history." 



28 

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